


To Fall Down At Your Door

by sunsetmog



Category: BBC Radio 1 RPF, One Direction (Band)
Genre: Accidental Marriage, Getting Together, M/M, Secret Marriage, Sort Of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-13
Updated: 2019-12-13
Packaged: 2021-02-17 21:55:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,373
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21650377
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunsetmog/pseuds/sunsetmog
Summary: Nick has failed to pay attention in any of the meetings leading up to him filming a documentary in the Scottish Highlands, mostly because he's just been dumped and he's in the middle of some very important wallowing. This does not entirely explain what Louis Tomlinson is doing there filming in the Highlands with him, and it absolutely does not explain why the world's press seems to think that they've just got married without telling anyone.He's fairly certain none of this is actually his fault, but it doesn't change the fact that everything has suddenly got a little bit weird.
Relationships: Nick Grimshaw/Louis Tomlinson
Comments: 31
Kudos: 303
Collections: The Tomlinshaw Fic Exchange 2019





	To Fall Down At Your Door

**Author's Note:**

  * For [silvered_glass](https://archiveofourown.org/users/silvered_glass/gifts).



> Silv gave me the most wonderfully detailed prompt for this fic, and I (promptly) went off and only wrote parts of it. For that I am sorry, but I hope you enjoy accidental, secret weddings (although not quite) and filming in the Highlands, as promised. 
> 
> Title is from 500 Miles by the Proclaimers. I have flown in and out of Inverness once, stayed in a lovely hotel in Nairn that may possibly have been stuck in a 1980s timewarp, and have turned around and driven endless miles north the morning after to stay somewhere else. Despite all of that, I haven't done much research into specifics, and only did a bit of cursory Googling about queer weddings in Scottish churches, and teenagers experiencing rural isolation, so I hope you'll bear with me for any inaccuracies. 
> 
> Thank you to my lovely friend who put up with me whining when writing wasn't going well, and for offering some much needed validation to get me going again. 
> 
> There is one mention of someone (off screen) getting support for dealing with past self-harm, and a couple of mentions of grief, if that's helpful info.

It starts, as most of these things tend to, with him not paying attention. In his defence, it's not actually entirely his fault. 

Well, in reality, if Nick's honest, it starts before that, probably around the time he agreed (in principle) that being involved in some documentary filming and radio segments on behalf of a nationwide children's charity wasn't a bad idea. After a series of meetings - and with hindsight, he should have paid more attention in them and not fucked around on his phone so much, which was _entirely_ his fault and no one else's - this really rather led him to this point, here, where he's freezing his arse off in the Scottish Highlands and trying not to be all that concerned that the photographs seemed to suggest he's gone and got secretly married to Louis fucking Tomlinson. 

There are articles both online and in the papers to back it up, and likely as not he's fucked everything completely up, almost entirely by accident and in a way that is decidedly not his actual fault.

Even hearing Louis fucking Tomlinson wailing _we're not fucking married, this is a fucking joke_ through the wall doesn't make him feel any better. 

The thing is, he's not entirely certain if anyone even wants to listen to the truth right now. 

He might not be married, but there's no doubt at all that his world's just changed and probably isn't going to change back. 

***

"The weather forecast says sunny intervals and a gentle breeze," Nick says from inside his wardrobe, chucking t-shirts behind him in the general direction of his suitcase. 

"It does," Aimee agrees, "but it also says highs of five degrees and lows of one. I don't even work in fucking celsius and even I know that's colder than a t-shirt and the odd hoody. And it's November. Pack a fucking sweater." She's propped up on all his pillows, on her phone and barely paying Nick any attention at all. 

It's infuriating. Nick wants to be attended to. He groans, and flops back onto the bed, staring miserably up at the ceiling. "What the fuck am I doing?"

Aimee pats him helpfully on the knee. "What you're doing, kiddo, is getting out of this house and out of this pit you've been in for weeks."

"I thought he was the one." It is not his fault it sounds like a whine. He's allowed to whine. His relationship has disintegrated in a flash fire and it's not his fault that he's miserable about it. "The _one_ , Aims."

Aimee rolls her eyes. "I know. But he wasn't. He only ate one type of cheese. You can't live out your entire life with someone who thinks mild cheddar is the be-all and end-all of the dairy market. He had to go."

"Pixie doesn't eat cheese at all, and we're not dumping her."

"Pixie has morals. Your guy stole your sweaters."

"Borrowed them."

"Well, you're not getting them back now, are you? He didn't listen to music. His car was tuned to that godawful talk radio. I only got a ride with him twice, and my life span visibly shortened both times. I have a child, Grim. I can't live a shorter life just because you got caught up with some dickhead with a perfect cock and nothing in his head."

"It was a perfect cock," Nick agrees morosely. "I didn't choke once."

"Good to know," Aimee says. "Doesn't matter, though. It's been five weeks and you're not sitting here being miserable anymore. You're going on holiday."

"It's not a holiday, it's work. And it's Scotland. You can't go on holiday to Scotland at this time of year."

"Think you'll find you can."

"Ugh," Nick says, and makes a show of rolling off the bed and throwing a dirty hoodie into his case. Aimee fishes it out again and puts it in the washing basket. 

"Get up," she says. "Stop being a loser dickhead. Pick out clothes. Put them in your bag. Then we can go and have a drink and stop being miserable about your fucking ex."

"Fine," Nick says finally, and grumbles the whole time he's putting things in his suitcase. 

Aimee, who's far better a friend than she should be, pats him on the shoulder and kisses him on the temple. "It'll be okay, champ," she says finally. "Promise."

Nick's not sure he believes her, but he'll give getting there his best shot.

***

Inverness airport is essentially nothing more than a small-ish hanger in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by rain and dark and cold, and Nick is regretting all of his life choices as he shivers his way to the taxi rank. The driver he thinks he was supposed to meet but never confirmed arrangements with hasn't shown up, the airport's practically empty, and back in London no one is answering their phone. Flying up at a different time to everybody else seemed like a good idea at the time - Nick is too busy suffering the after effects of being dumped to engage in normal human behaviour like travelling in packs - but now that he's here and in charge of his own travel arrangements, it rather seems like a bad idea. 

_Gateway to the Highlands, my arse._

He ends up hiring a car and miserably trying to figure out how it all works whilst damply aware his coat is not up to scratch against either the weather and the temperature, and his mobile is almost out of charge so he has no fucking idea where he's going. In the end, he resolves to drive in any direction and stop at the first hotel he sees, which is why he ends up in Nairn, which is the wrong direction, and sitting rather miserably in a room from 1985 overlooking some outbuildings and trying to remember the word for _valance_ as he texts Aimee updates on his miserable life. 

_get over yourself_ , she texts back. _you're better than this pit of despair. go to sleep and grow a pair._

It's fair advice. He just wishes he knew how to actually take it. 

***

The next day, buoyed up by a cooked breakfast and a few hours sleep, he turns back around and drives back the way he came, up past the airport and in the general direction of _further north_. He stops en-route to buy a much better winter coat, the kind that offers both wind and rain protection, and is immediately both warmer and more comfortable than he was in his shit London alternative. Then he drives, and he drives, and he drives some more until the scenery has stopped being beautiful and has become more of him whining _not another fucking view_ as he drives around another bend and sees water and hills and villages off until the horizon.

His destination, once he gets there, is a village where he and the small production team will be filming part of a documentary about the real, palpable impact of charitable funds to isolated young people in rural areas. Nick's fronting part of it, and there are a few days planned of him going to see some of the things money has funded, and talking to some of the kids and young adults directly affected. Once that's done, he'll stay for a couple of days and then go further north to help launch the Radio 1 endurance challenge that Greg James is doing, and it'll all be wrapped up into a couple of documentary episodes for iPlayer and some slots for the radio about inspiring young people. 

No matter that isolated rural areas are the fucking point of all this, Nick is a crap driver and it's cold and he one hundred per cent does not believe in the weather forecast's promise of 'sunny intervals', and he's pissed off about wasting months cock deep in a relationship with a dickhead who wanked on about the derivative state of the current pop music scene but had a Counting Crows CD in his car and not much else. Nick's pissed off with himself more than anything else, for feeling something for a knobhead with a gorgeous cock and nothing else going for him, and is in the middle of giving himself a jolly good talking to when he realises that he's just sped past a sign for the place he's supposed to be going. He executes a terrible u-turn, gets beeped at about six times, and finds himself on a road to the arse end of fucking nowhere, which is probably apt considering the state of his fucking life. 

He's staying in a place called something-or-other Lodge, and they were expecting him last night, except he's a disaster of a human and who clearly didn't know what the fuck he's doing or how he's supposed to get there. The couple who run the Lodge - Kate and Iain - seem a little bemused by him failing to show up when expected and by his detour to Nairn, but he's more of a hit with their two labradors, Bracken and Celia, who follow him up the stairs to the rooms and pad about his feet like they're shepherding him home. 

"This is you," Iain says, opening up one of the rooms with an expert flick of his wrist to cover up a sticky handle. Nick can see his future right now, being stuck in here forever with a broken door, but that seems fair considering what life has dealt him so far. "It'll be exciting for us all, really, having a proper television crew up here. You've booked out all of our rooms, the ones above the pub, and the little bed and breakfast Pat and Tony have got up by the wood. We're all looking forward to it."

Nick attempts to look some kind of enthusiastic but in reality, he's regretting leaving London at all. He's not up to this. He's spent the past few weeks eating ice cream in his gym clothes and dealing with the dairy-related fall out afterwards. Stumbling to the country for a couple of days' break before work starts seems very Bridget Jones of him, and quite frankly, that kind of escapade always left Bridget distressingly worse off, and usually humiliated. That seems rather par for the course when it comes to Nick's life right now, so he plasters on a smile and says something about a nice shower and a nap to try and nudge Iain out of the door so he can be left alone. 

His room is small but spotless, a little double with an en-suite bathroom and a short bath that promises to fit at least half of his limbs in with only the fiercest discomfort as standard. Iain leaves him with a folder of information about the local area, a promise to bring him up some of the better biscuits for the little tea and coffee tray on the dressing table, and one of the dogs. Nick isn't entirely certain whether it's Bracken or Celia, but either way, they're very happy to sprawl out across his feet as he drinks a cup of instant coffee and flicks through the guide to village life. There's virtually no mobile signal and getting the Wi-Fi password would involve removing a snoozing dog, so he sucks it up and lays there on the bed with no internet and no phone, and pretends like it's 1994. 

At least in 1994, Nick was too young to be thinking about dying alone and never having anyone love him. 

***

He offers to take the dogs for a walk in the morning after breakfast. He's slept all right, the breakfast was nice, and the rest of the crew are arriving after lunch. He's connected to the Wi-Fi, been emailed the final scripts, and it doesn't feel quite so much like a fucking disaster as it did yesterday or the day before. So: Kate and Iain lend him their dogs, draw him a route map on a bit of printer paper, and send him off to skirt around the woods and go down to the water for a bit with the labradors.

He has a perfectly nice time and comes back feeling rosy-cheeked and fresh faced, with two muddy dogs in tow, and then he comes to a rather comically frozen stop because Louis Tomlinson is getting his bags out of the back of a 4x4 outside the Lodge. 

"Hello," he says, because he's relatively certain he's not missing something. That _is_ Louis Tomlinson. 

"All right, mate?" Louis says, without really stopping unloading his suitcase. 

"Um," Nick says. "Yes?" He can't quite figure out how to say, _what the fuck are you doing here?_ because as far as he knew, the production team had shelved the idea of getting someone else to front the documentary with him because no one was returning their calls, but he'd mostly stopped listening in those meetings about five weeks ago and was clearly paying the price now. "How are you?"

"Good, thanks, mate." Louis deposits his suitcase on the gravel and then comes over to give Nick a handshake, which is all terrible grown up and not in the least bit helpful in ascertaining what the flying fuck Louis is actually doing here, at a Lodge B&B in the middle of nowhere somewhere north west of Inverness. "Hear you got the only double room?"

Nick is paid rather handsomely for his ability to talk for a living, which does rather mean that him only really coming up with different varieties of _um_ to respond to Louis is rather a let down on a number of fronts. He settles for, "I might have done. Sorry."

"It's all right." Louis has dropped to a crouch so he can say hello to the dogs, who are suitably enthusiastic about being appreciated and want to share their muddy paws with the new arrival. "I've got two singles. Means I can dump all my crap on one and sleep on the other. Much easier than having to tidy your bed every night."

"Of course," Nick says, and considers a number of sentences that all end up cycling back to _what the fuck are you doing here_. He discards it as an option, and then ends up standing there, like an idiot, whilst Louis makes friends with the dogs. "You're here too, then," he says finally, and Louis looks up at him with a grin. 

"Were you expecting someone else?"

"I'm not going to lie," Nick says, "my life's been in such a mess these past few weeks, I'm barely certain that I'm actually here. There's a distinct possibility that I'm actually at home, face down in my own hangover bemoaning how I've just been dumped again, instead of here and doing thoroughly wholesome stuff like walking other people's dogs."

"Fair," Louis says, getting awkwardly to his feet. "You, uh, just got dumped, then?"

"I mean, _just_ is pushing it. I'm in week five of my melodramatic fall from grace, and even my mates have given up on trying to comfort me through it. Aimee practically drove me to the airport, and she booked me an extra couple of nights so I could get away from, like, everything. And she's looking after my dogs."

"Right," Louis says. 

Nick is thoroughly aware that he's wanking on about nothing, and should just shut the fuck up, but that's easier said than done. He's spent two days by himself and quite frankly he's not built for it. "You haven't just been dumped, have you? So I'm not hogging the limelight with my own misery."

"Seven months ago now," Louis says, picking up his bag. The dogs bound up around him, and he's definitely got at least one muddy paw print on his tracksuit bottoms. "I'm mostly past the lying facedown in my own hangover part of it."

"Good to know an end comes," Nick says, following him inside. He perhaps should be doing more to look after the dogs, but they've had a good walk and are particularly friendly and Louis seems to like them, so he doesn't push it too much. "Is anyone else here yet?"

"Don't think anyone else is coming until this evening. I flew up from Manchester instead of London, so got here earlier."

"Cool," Nick says, bundling the muddy dogs back towards their owners. If they're anything like his dogs, they're going to whine about having to have a bath. It's one part of dog-owning he doesn't mind not having to do. There's a pause as he follows Louis up the stairs to the rooms. "Are you hungry? Hear the pub does a Sunday roast."

"Christ, yes," Louis says. "Give me five minutes."

Nick, for want of something better to do, goes and lies full length on the bed with his face in a pile of white, lacy pillowcases, and tries to stop berating himself for his terrible taste in men. 

***

The pub, when they get there, isn't that full, and Nick goes to get them a table at the back whilst Louis goes to the bar. He's checked his paperwork and the new scripts do have NG and LT on them, so he definitely missed at least one memo about his co-host, but they don't have much to do together. They're here to talk about teenagers experiencing rural isolation, and Louis's going to be doing some bits with the sports club, and Nick doing more to bridge it all together, talking about their youth club, the music and media facilities at the community centre, and the counselling offer through the local high school. Nick's going to meet specifically with a couple of kids they'll follow in a bit more detail, whereas Louis is going to train with the football team. Nick is not one for loudly admitting he's been stupid, so he fully intends on pretending that he knew Louis was going to be here all along. 

He'll see how well that goes, because he's not that good at pretending, either. 

Louis, when he comes back from the bar, has two pints in his hands and his wallet in his mouth. "Didn't know what you wanted, but you can't go wrong with a beer, can you?" he says, sitting down opposite Nick and sliding one of the pints across the table. "I asked him about the roasts and apparently they're out of the pork belly, but they've got a couple of lambs and roast beefs left, and they can do you a vegetarian thing if you don't eat meat. Didn't know what you fancied so he said he'd come over in a minute and take our orders."

"What are you having?"

Louis makes a face. "Beef, obviously. I'm not a monster." He takes a gulp of his beer. "It's good, that. Asked him for whatever was on tap."

Nick is only partially able to ascertain which beer is which under general circumstances, and he doesn't normally pick it over a bottle, but a pint does go pretty well with a Sunday lunch. "Yeah, it's all right. I think I'll have the beef too."

Louis waves the barman over, and they order two roast beefs. They get the last two, so Louis doesn't have to consider becoming a monster and picking something else. After the barman's put their order into the kitchen, he comes over again to wipe the beef off the chalkboard menu. The pub's nice, a bit bigger than Nick had expected given the size of the village, and the kitchen seems relatively busy. There's a fireplace with an actual crackling fire, and a jukebox in the corner playing an odd selection of Tom Jones and Elvis Presley, and there are pictures on the walls of various local teams, including one that's labelled SHINTY 2011 and appears to involve a sport Nick's never even heard of. 

"You ever heard of Shinty?" Nick asks in an undertone, nodding at the picture.

Louis glances at it. "Nope. Looks a bit like hockey, though. Maybe it's hockey?"

"Maybe," Nick says, but he's not convinced. He's also aware that a lot of people are looking at them, and there is at least one family over the other side of the room that has teenage kids that are doing their level best to stare open-mouthed at Louis, to the extent of forgetting to eat. "I think we've got an audience."

Louis sighs. "I bet." He takes another drink of his beer. "Are they staring at me or you?"

"I'm going to take a risk and bet on you," Nick says. He knows that the production crew have tried to slide under the radar and that even the kids Nick will be meeting with don't know that it's him they're coming to see tomorrow. Given that even Nick didn't know Louis was coming, it's a strong chance that the village inhabitants don't either. 

"Are they coming over?"

"Not just yet," Nick says. "One of them just failed to get her food in her mouth, though. Proper pronged herself in the chin with her fork."

"Unfortunate," Louis says. "Are you all right with it if they ask for a picture?"

"I don't know how i'm supposed to cope under these circumstances," Nick says, making a face and putting on a voice. "I'm always in the spotlight, it's unrelenting."

"Shut it, you," Louis says. "I was just checking." There's a pause. "Do you think, if we eat quickly enough, we can bag some sticky toffee pudding before it runs out? It's still on the blackboard so it hasn't gone yet."

Nick should really think about his hips, but he can't quite face it, not just now. "Go on, then," he says. "If you're twisting my arm." He sounds like his dad. The grief, ever-present but mostly quiet, rears its head for a moment. 

"Cool," Louis says, and then, "I'm going to see if they'll save us a couple of helpings."

It is, Nick reflects, the first time he's been properly hungry in weeks. 

They wander back to the Lodge after they've eaten, royally full of roast potatoes and sticky toffee pudding. The girls had come over to say hello to Louis after a bit, and they'd had their picture taken alongside their mostly finished bowls of custard. The girls, Ellen and Martha, were 14 and 16, and they'd chatted and asked about Niall (Ellen's favourite) and Louis had managed to extract a promise from them not to share their pictures until the end of the week, when Louis and Nick had left to go back to London. 

"We're just up here for something a bit special, that's all," Louis had said, because part of the filming they were doing tomorrow involved surprising some of the kids involved, and that sort of thing worked better if not everyone in the local area knew they were there. "Bit private, you know?"

The girls had promised, and Louis had given them both another hug and a picture of the four of them together, Ellen, Martha, Nick and Louis taken by the girls' mum, as a thank you. 

"It's quiet up here, innit?" Louis says, as they wander back along the road. 

"Dunno what to do with myself," Nick says. "Think I'd go mad if I lived somewhere like this. What do you do with yourself?"

"Same as you do wherever you grow up, I suppose. Drink Shite Lightning in the park and do stupid stuff to make the girls laugh."

"That's what i was doing wrong," Nick says. "Didn't do enough to make the girls laugh."

"That'll be it," Louis says. He glances at Nick. "Don't tell anyone, will you, but I kind of wanted to make the boys laugh too."

There's a pause. "Because you're a natural comedian, or because of something else?"

"Oh, you know. Probably something else, looking back. Didn't get it at the time, obviously. Didn't get it for ages, actually."

It does rather feel like Louis Tomlinson might be coming out to him. Nick shoves his hands in the pockets of his outdoorsy coat, and attempts a sidelong glance in Louis's general direction. "You get it now?"

"Pretty loud and clear, yeah." He kicks at the gravel by the edge of the road. "Don't tell anyone, will you? I've only just started to figure it out." 

"I suppose sometimes it just takes a while."

"Definitely does if you're with someone as long as I was. Wasn't like I was looking at anyone else, lad or lass. It's only now that, you know."

"You're embracing your true comedian."

"Something like that," Louis says. "Don't tell anyone, will you? I thought you might get it, that's all."

Nick nods. He doesn't really know what else to say, and maybe Louis doesn't either, because neither of them say anything else the whole way back to the Lodge. 

***

That first day's filming is _long_. Louis's out before Nick is, going to some early morning practice session for some sport or other, and Nick should be used to early mornings but he's out of the habit, and stumbling onto someone's doorstep at 7am for a surprise _hello!_ has made the bags under his eyes extra puffy. He's going to have to do a face mask when he gets back in and hopes no one knocks on his door; his pores are cavernous. Someone could drown in them, and no one wants that. Or maybe not drown. Maybe fall in and never be able to get out and starve to death. 

This is, he presumes, the beginning of leaving his dickhead ex-boyfriend behind him, and thank fuck for that. When he tells Aimee he's fairly certain she might even dance for joy; he's been a right mardy fucker for weeks now, but knowing it doesn't exactly make it easier to stop being one. He’s not entirely sure how heartbroken he ever really was, either. Or at least, not about him. He’s really rather certain he’s in the middle of a nervous breakdown because he’s so fucking terrible at all the things his friends are doing so well - settling down, making commitments, creating families. He’s only good at losing his sweaters and cultivating a collection of trainers and picking people who aren’t even that interested in knowing him in the short term, let along the longer. 

The production team lay on sandwiches for lunch from the local cafe, but filming runs on so long that Nick’s reduced to accepting a defrosted Ginsters pasty from Maggie, the mum of the teenage girl Nick’s spent the afternoon with. Emily is really up front about how depression has impacted her life ever since she’d been in primary school, and how isolating it was for her and her family to have no resources to turn to. Emily was relatively stoic and very well-adjusted considering; it was Nick who had to do a straight to camera afterwards about access to services and support in rural areas after Emily talked about her self harm and her referral to a counselling service operating out of Glasgow. They’re hundreds of miles from Glasgow. 

Louis’s had much the same kind of day, kicking the ball about after school with the community sports teams, founded after a local boy died. 

“Hard, innit?” He says, when Nick joins him for a cigarette around the picnic table at the bottom of Kate and Iain’s garden. They’re technically no-smoking, but Kate had handed them an ash tray and sent them 200 metres down the garden with an instruction to leave no trace of their rule breaking. Nick appreciates it, particularly after Louis rubs his eyes with the heels of his hands and admits he’d had to hide in a toilet earlier and deep breathe after the lads had talked about their good memories of their dead friend. 

“Yeah,” Nick says. He takes a drag of his cigarette. “Have you eaten?”

“Sandwich.” 

“You want to go to the pub and see if they can rustle us up something that comes with chips?”

“Do I ever,” Louis says, and that explains why they end up back in the pub again, arguing over who gets the last sausage and mash and who gets pie and chips. In the end, their bickering must annoy the barman enough that he agrees to swap their orders around and serve pie and mash, and sausage and chips, and both Nick and Louis think they’ve got the best end of the deal. They both clearly think the other is crackers, but frankly, Nick’s had a long day and he’ll cope with Louis thinking him bonkers if there’s some kind of potato product in front of him soon. 

“How’d they get you involved with this, anyway?” Nick asks after a reasonable amount of time spent gorging on potatoes, and they’ve both emerged, sated, from the other side of the plate. 

Louis shrugs. “I like the idea of helping people. Just not all that sure how, all the time. Other than throwing money at it, which helps. And they asked. Not many people do, if I’m honest, and my mum always said we should try and help when we can.”

“Fair enough,” Nick says. “I like helping people too, but if I’m honest, I just didn’t pay enough attention in meetings and I sort of ended up here by accident. Call it an after-effect of my personal mid life crisis.”

Louis rolls his eyes at him. “Mid life crisis, what the fuck are you.”

“Oi,” Nick says. “I’m telling you my sob story here, and you’re laughing.”

Louis holds his hands up. “Not laughing if you don’t want me to.”

"Good," Nick says, and feels oddly warm in his chest. 

He blames the potatoes, because anything else would be too weird to contemplate.

***

Filming continues, and so do their outings to the pub so that Louis can try every pie on the menu and Nick can resolve to make different life choices when he's back in London. They eat, they beg for sticky toffee pudding even though it's not always on the chalkboard, and they talk about their favourite albums growing up, because the elephant in the room is still small enough for them both to ignore.

Anyway, Louis's sexuality is for him to define, not Nick, and he knows where Nick is if he wants to talk in any more detail. Not that Nick will necessarily be all that much help; he's been so self-involved recently that the switch to looking outward is proving something of a strain. 

It is, however, nice. Hanging out with Louis is _nice_. 

When their final morning of location filming rolls around, Nick’s feeling pleasantly refreshed by life. The air must be doing him some good, he thinks, going down for breakfast and says yes to all the options Kate and Iain suggest for his cooked breakfast. He’s half way down his second cup of coffee when Louis rolls in, vaguely bleary eyed and clad in a top that bears more than a passing resemblance to a shell suit Nick had as a child. He'd liked it then, too. 

“Morning,” Nick says, trying to hide his smirk. Louis is awful in the morning, only half with it and greedy for tea, taking the biggest mug Kate and Iain have and cradling it to his chest as he nods his _yes_ to whatever they're going to offer him for breakfast. It’s been glorious watching Louis attempt to come to life whenever their breakfasts had coincided this week.

“Shut it, you,” Louis says. “Just because this is practically midday for you.”

“Not any more it isn’t. Afternoons, innit? Anyway, maybe I’m just smiling because I get to see your wonderful face of a morning.”

Louis rolls his eyes. “You’re such a dickhead.”

“Drink your tea,” Nick says, but he’s grinning, and it’s been fucking weeks since he’s even felt vaguely like smiling, so clearly Scotland’s been good for him. Aimee was clearly right and he had needed to get away from it all and get some distance. The rolling hills and the frank conversations he’s had with a handful of different teenagers have got to him; London is all noise and late nights and constant consumerism. He can get whatever he wants in the middle of the night and fourteen different types of transport to get there. His friends can get to him without any trouble and they’re not reliant on a bus service that only runs every now and again, at three times the cost of a London bus. If he gets sick there’s a fucking selection of hospitals, and if he’s not satisfied he can go private - not that he has, or will - but he can do all of that without travelling further than about 45 minutes from his home. His mobile (generally) works. The impact of isolation on troubled teenagers has been a bit eye-opening, even given that he’d grown up far away from London, both literally and physically. It’s not as easy to be different when there’s less of a crowd to blend in with. It’s not that he’d forgotten, but maybe it’s slipped his mind. London is its own country. 

Louis is a bit more awake after a plate that’s almost entirely full of sausages - although exactly how much more awake is up for debate, because Louis definitely walks into a door on his way out of the dining room to their production meeting. They spend most of the meeting with Louis kicking him under the table and Nick failing to take much attention to their schedule, so quite frankly the plan for the rest of the day is almost a blur. He is relatively good at taking direction, however, which explains how he finds himself being given a little powder and a re-touch by Tina, the make up artist, in the community centre down the road as they wait for the kids from the local school to join them for their music club. 

"Hopefully my pores won't be quite so obvious now," Nick says, joining Louis by the window after he's been made up. "They're practically cavernous at the moment, it's a wonder anyone can look at me."

Louis rolls his eyes at him. "Do I look like the right target audience for this?"

"You're the only one I've got," Nick says, "and you're captive, so look forward to getting up close and comfortable with my skin care regime."

"Cracking." He's got one elbow resting on the windowsill. Outside the hills roll away into the distance, forests on the hill tops, a world away from London's top-heavy density. "Look at the light here, mate. It's fucking amazing. What a view."

"Don't get that in North London," Nick agrees. 

"It's better in the church," someone says, and when they turn around, it's to be faced with Andy, the vicar. The community centre sprawls across the corner of the church grounds, and they seem to have a convivial sort of relationship that allows them both to use the rooms when necessary. "Do you want to come and see?"

"Sure," Louis says, displaying a level of enthusiasm for lighting that had apparently hitherto remained perfectly hidden. "Come on, Nick."

Nick, who has a sort of normal relationship with light - or so he'd always thought, but who is bored hanging around and who has enjoyed spending time with Louis this week - follows him in the general direction of the church. JP, the cameraman, follows them because it probably can't hurt to have a bit more background footage, and anyway, they're all a bit bored hanging around. 

The church is the kind of building that looks suitably strict and dour from the outside, but inside has a glorious window that pours light over the whole front of the church. It's been fairly overcast all week, but today the skies are clear and bright, and subsequently everyone is freezing but bathed in sunshine. 

"Isn't it great?" Andy says, leading them down the aisle with some degree of enthusiasm. "Try standing here at the front. When I do a wedding, I always hope for a clear day like this because it showers everyone in light. Wonderful start to a life, I always think."

"Hmmm," Nick says, for want of something better to say, and because he's suddenly overwhelmed with the memory of his terrible ex-boyfriend and the knowledge that all of his friends are committing and getting married and having babies and moving forward with their lives and he's just… not. He can't move forward in the same direction as his friends, and it sucks. 

Louis elbows him. "You've got a right face on you," he says. "Stand there and let the sun shine on you, or something." They're right at the front of the church, in front of the altar, and Louis gets his phone out and takes a picture of Nick. 

"What was that for?" 

"Dunno," Louis says, and he only slightly avoids Nick's eyes. Nick feels a jolt somewhere deep inside of him, like he's just hit a bumper in a dodgem car and all of his internal organs are just a little bit out of kilter. "Lighting's good, and it's been a good week. Thought maybe I'd remember what it felt like to be here when I'm messing about on my phone."

That's fair enough, but Nick takes a moment to let his internal organs settle back into alignment. He's dangerously close to admitting to a crush. Anyway, Nick likes collecting memories too. He's had no fucking network on his phone all week, but he's taken a few snaps too, bits of this week he's wanted to keep. It's been peaceful, of sorts. Not that he's any closer to wanting to give up the life he has for himself in London, but the break's been nice. Even when he goes on holiday he tends to cultivate it for public approval, the Instagram posts and the stories and tales he crafts for the radio. He likes it like that; he's not going to stop, but it feels different up here. He's had to talk to kids and to camera, but the rest of it's been his. His awful ex-boyfriend feels really rather more ex than he had done last week. His new friendship with Louis seems suddenly rather important. 

"We haven't had a gay wedding up here yet," Andy's talking, and Nick has to shift his focus back to the church, and the vicar, and to Louis next to him, who's flushing a little. His secret sits with Nick, the broadening of Louis's lines, his better understanding of the place he takes up in the world. He glances at Nick, then away again. "Love to do one, honestly, but we haven't yet. Church of Scotland's still got some way to go, but it's nice to see the United Reformed Church leading the way for once."

This - factually - means almost nothing to Nick, who's never been religious in his life and has practically zero understanding of Scottish religious denominations, but it doesn't stop the heavy thump in his chest at the continuing knowledge that he's not equal. That, if he was to marry someone who believed in God, they might not be able to have a religious ceremony the way his partner might want. For every mountain climbed, there's another one behind it. Sometimes Nick can't help but wonder what it's like to be someone whose life is laid out in a way that means normal milestones weren't at the top of a fucking mountain that other people have died trying to climb. 

"Right direction, though, innit?" Louis says, with a sideways glance at Nick. 

"Something like that," Nick says, trying to focus his attention on something other that equal rights and his newly admitted feelings for Louis. They're stood at the front of the church, in front of Andy, and it's just the same as if they really were getting married. The light streams through the window, bathing them all in it. It illuminates Louis's skin. For a moment, just a moment, Nick imagines standing here for real, Louis at his side. It's slightly more of a possibility than it ever was before, given Louis's journey towards finding himself, and given that he's let Nick into his secret, but it's still a stupid thought. They might have got along all week, and there might be the possibility of _something_ between them, but there's a long way to go from that to actual marriage. Nick's fantasist mind has got the better of him again, which is always the fucking problem.

"Let's get a proper picture," JP says, from half way down the aisle. "Take proper advantage of this light."

Nick complies, always eager to be the centre of attention and particularly enthusiastic at this juncture so that he can stop imagining him and Louis together like that. He and Louis end up leaning in to each other, Andy the vicar behind them on the steps, the three of them grinning as JP takes a few shots with his camera. Then Louis asks for one on his phone, and as he steps back after handing it over, he wraps an arm around Nick's waist and practically invites Nick to slide an arm around his shoulders as JP takes one picture and then another, Louis sticking one finger up after a moment. Nick, rolls his eyes, joining in. 

Then afterwards, when Louis gets his phone back and JP's talking to Andy, they pore over his camera roll, trying to pick out a good one. In the end, Louis says he'll share all of the pictures with Nick, and then there's a rigmarole making sure they have each other's up to date numbers which feels very much like a set up to Nick, who's engineered enough of these situations over the years to give a cute boy his number that he can't help but be aware of what they fucking look like. Louis might look a bit flushed around the cheekbones, but maybe that's just the fucking miraculous light, who the fuck knows. 

Nick can't just jump from one obsession to another, although the temptation is particularly strong when it's Louis at the end of it, grinning at him and always wanting another fucking pie. He _can't_.

It doesn't stop him wanting to, though. 

"They're here," Andrea says, from the doorway, and the kids have arrived from the school, and it's time to talk music clubs and the power of fucking song. 

***

He wakes up to a disaster. 

Well, he wakes up to Iain knocking on his bedroom door, pale-faced, and asking if Nick can come downstairs and take a phone call. For a moment, Nick thinks someone's died, but Iain just shakes his head. 

"It's not that," he says. "I'm sorry if it was a secret. Seems like it's got out."

Nick has no idea what's going on, but that's soon rectified after three minutes on the phone with his publicist, Donna, who yells at him for the first two minutes about keeping her in the loop, and then, rather reluctantly, offers her congratulations.

"What," Nick says, a trifle blankly. "What the fuck's going on?"

"Your wedding," Donna says. "The pictures have leaked."

"My what now," Nick says. 

"There's no point trying to be secret about it now. The pictures are everywhere."

"What pictures," Nick says, because he's fairly sure he'd remember a wedding. 

"I always thought you'd dress up for it, if I'm honest, but maybe that's just Louis Tomlinson's influence. And I thought we had a deal, you told me who you were sleeping with? Honestly, it's a wonder I'm not firing you as a client. I'm going to fucking bollock you when we're back face-to-face, though."

There has to be a good chance he's sleeping, because none of this conversation is making any sense at all. 

He's helped, it turns out, by Kate, who shoves an Acer laptop in front of him. It's the BBC page showing the aggregation of the day's front covers. The picture of him and Louis on the steps with the vicar in the church from yesterday is on the front of the Mirror, the Sun, and the Mail. 

_Louis weds Grimmy_ , the Mirror says. 

Nick sits down. It turns out there isn't a chair so he ends up on the floor in the hallway of the Lodge, Kate's laptop on his knee. 

"I'm not married," he says. "We didn't get married."

"Well," Donna says. "I don't know who the fuck's going to believe that now."

Nick tips his head back against the wall, and lets out a breath. 

***

He goes back to his bedroom. The Wi-Fi doesn't always reach up here, and it definitely doesn't reach the bedside table, where he'd plugged his phone in last night. When he moves it over to the dressing table, it starts to vibrate from all the messages. Through the wall he can hear Louis having a loud conversation on the phone, rather frequently peppered with _fuck_. 

His mum calls, and she cries through her congratulations. Nick saying, "We're not actually married," doesn't seem to penetrate all that strongly, and he's fairly convinced that the conversation ends with her believing that he and Louis have had a church blessing. After that, the phone keeps on ringing, and Nick doesn't answer any of the calls, scrolling through Twitter and the news as his stomach sinks, until it's Aimee ringing, and she opens the conversation with a fairly neat, "What the _fuck_ , Grim."

"Shut up," Nick says. "Don't talk. Just listen. Me and Louis Tomlinson did not get married, we did not get blessed, we are not together, no fucking ceremony happened, this is a gigantic misunderstanding, and no one will listen."

"So that picture of you and Louis together at the fucking altar is a photoshop, then?"

"Don't sound so fucking mad," Nick says. "It's not a photoshop, we were just talking to the vicar or whatever, because Louis was, like, _the light is fantastic here_ , whatever whatever, and we took some pictures together, and that picture was not one of them, and I don't know where everyone got the idea from that me and Louis _got married_ , because it's an absolute joke. I don't know why everyone's been so quick to believe it. My mum cried."

There's a pause. "It looks like a wedding picture, Grim."

"Everyone thinks Louis's straight," Nick says. "If they think that, why do they think he'd get married to a guy?"

"I don't know. Because it looks like a fucking wedding picture. You're fucking illuminated. It's like God herself came down and stood over the two of you and went, hey, here's a perfectly framed shot, I'd better turn the light up so everyone in the world believes you're madly in love."

"I left you, like, a week ago. I was nursing a broken heart."

"You were not," Aimee says. "You didn't love him. You were nursing a mid-life crisis and needed to stop wallowing."

"Me and Louis didn't get married," Nick says. 

"Are you absolutely fucking sure you didn't accidentally say _I do_ or anything?"

"The vicar said he would like to do a gay wedding and that was literally the extent of the marriage conversation. Literally the extent of it."

"He'd like to do a gay wedding, and he'd like to start with the two of you?"

"For fuck's sake," Nick says. "What am I going to do?"

Aimee sighs. "I don't fucking know. Everyone believes it's true. I'm in on about six different Whatsapp threads about surprise parties for you. People are happy for you."

"Christ," Nick says, and if there's anything to say in response to that, neither of them can think of it right now. 

***

Louis comes and sits with him after a while. Nick's on the floor by the window with his back up against the radiator. He's put his phone on silent but it still keeps lighting up with messages. Louis has his in his hand, relentlessly tapping it against his knee. 

"So," Nick says. 

"So," Louis says. 

"People are weirdly happy for us."

"Yeah," Louis says. 

There doesn't seem to be anything else to say. Kate brings them both up a cup of tea after a bit, but it's arranged on a tray with a plate of biscuits that have been hastily decorated to say _congratulations_ in blue icing. 

"We're not married," Nick says, because they're not. 

"Not officially," Kate agrees. "Some man from the council's been on the local news saying that no marriage licence has been issued in your names."

Nick blinks. 

"But unofficially," Kate goes on. "Andy does a lovely blessing. Iain and I went to one a couple of years ago for Sarah and Duncan, for their 25th anniversary. Lovely service." She taps her nose. "No licence needed for a blessing. And don't you two worry about pretending to have two rooms anymore, both of you can stay in here."

"We'll keep the other room," Louis says, after a minute pause. "But thank you."

When she's gone, they just stare at each other. 

"Well," Nick says. 

"Well," Louis says. 

They eat the biscuits. 

***

Martha and Ellen, the girls from the pub who'd had their photo taken with them both last Sunday, have kept to their side of the bargain about only posting their pictures at the end of the week. 

Louis had clearly hoped that this would coincide with them flying back south, but as it happens, the girls post the pictures on Twitter when Nick and Louis are in Louis's bedroom, where the WiFi is better. Louis's flight isn't scheduled to leave until tomorrow. Nick's supposed to be leaving in the morning to go north, and meet Greg James and some more Radio 1 people. As it stands, though, they're still in the Lodge with the telly on and the world getting stranger by the minute.

"Today just keeps on getting better and better," Nick says, when the Tweets are brought to their attention. 

_met @LouisTomlinson and @grimmers last Sunday when they were out on a date together in our local pub!!! They were both really nice and Louis promised to put in a good word for us with @NiallHoran if we promised not to post our pictures here until the end of the week!!!_

_Hope he keeps his end of the bargain!! They looked really happy together and have been in the pub here together more than once. my cousin is the barman and said they were fighting over who had the last pie and mash!!!_

_was so nervous meeting them, my hands were all sweaty but they both hugged me and my sister and were REALLY NICE. don't know if they're really married or not but they looked really happy on their date_

_NOTHING EXCITING EVER HAPPENS HERE and I can't believe they were up here and we got to meet them. LOVE YOU BOTH!!!! ps love you niall xxxx_

There's a pause. 

"Do you think we really looked like we were on a date?" Nick asks. He's not entirely sure Louis's heard him. 

"Do you think anyone in the fucking world is going to be surprised I'm bisexual? Because I was surprised. I didn't fucking know. Seems like everyone else fucking did."

Nick, for want of something better to do, wraps an arm around Louis's shoulders. "I didn't know," he says. "And no one out there really knows either. They'll only know if you tell them."

He doesn't expect Louis to rest his cheek against Nick's shoulder, but he does. 

"Thanks," Louis says, a little miserably. He has Twitter open on his laptop, and he stays where he is, pressed against Nick's side, as he opens the pictures the girls posted in full screen. 

Nick and Louis are in the middle of the picture, arms around each other, each with an arm around one of the girls. They're leaning in to each other, heads almost touching, both of them grinning. 

If you went into it wanting to see them as a couple, then that's pretty much exactly what you'd see. 

"Fuck," Nick says, succinctly, and Louis agrees. 

***

"This week," Louis says a little haltingly, once one of the crew has decided to brave the trip to the Chinese Takeaway in the next village over for them both, and they've been left alone in the privacy of Louis's bedroom again. "it's actually been really nice."

"It's been a good week," Nick agrees. 

"No," Louis says. "Not that bit of it. Spending time with you."

"Oh," Nick says. There's a pause. 

Louis looks a little flushed. "Doesn't matter."

"It does," Nick says. "I was just, you know. Thinking."

"Slow down, don't want to make a habit of it."

"Fuck off," Nick says. "I was just thinking. I came up here thinking I was all, like, broken-hearted. But I wasn't. Not about him, anyway. Sometimes you just get sad thinking about the stuff you don't have, right? Grieving for what might have been, maybe. But I've had a good week. I've had a good week with you."

Louis manages half a smile. "A good week, or a _good week_."

"They're exactly the same thing," Nick says, but they're not. He relents. "A good week. Because it was with you."

"Something you might consider doing again at some point?"

"Perhaps without the giant fucking newspaper headlines," Nick says. He knows Louis's waiting for him to say something else. It's just a case of which of them steps off the edge of the cliff first, instead of circling what they might be saying. Maybe it's his turn. Maybe it's him. "I'd go on a date with you. A real one. If you asked."

This time Louis laughs at him. "I'm asking, you idiot."

"Try using actual words next time," Nick says, but he settles back against the wall, Louis sitting next to him, knees touching. 

"I will," Louis says, but then he leans over and kisses Nick with dry lips. 

Nick looks at him. "Louis fucking Tomlinson."

"Louis fucking Tomlinson," Louis says, "is asking you on a date."

"Funny way of asking," Nick says, but then he leans over and kisses Louis back. "But I'm saying yes."

"Good," Louis says, and he grins. 

***

 _We're not married_ , Louis's tweet says, a few days later. The accompanying picture is of both of them, holding their left, ringless hands up to the camera, _but we are going out. Sorry for the confusion. It's all a bit new. Hope you will give us a bit of time and privacy to get to know each other ._

 _First I've heard of it_ , Nick tweets back. He finishes it off with the kiss face emoji, and the two boys holding hands. 

_Wanker_ , Louis tweets back, fondly. 

Nick's insta-story is just the two of them, cross-legged on the floor in Louis's house in London with Indian takeaway, their dogs, and the telly. 

Later on, when it's just the two of them, standing at the bottom of Louis's garden in the dark with a redundant ash tray and an empty packet of cigarettes, Louis goes up on his toes and kisses him for real, hands in Nick's hair, Nick's hands in the small of Louis's back. 

"Yeah?" Louis says afterwards. 

"Yeah," Nick says. No one believes they've only just got together, and a lot of people aren't keeping it a secret that they think they're really married. They're doing it backwards and everyone else is going full speed in the opposite direction. Louis's tweet is the only statement he's made about his sexuality. Nick's friends are still planning a surprise party they think Nick doesn't know about. 

In reality it is, as all new things are, a little bit fragile. 

"Are you going to steal my jumpers?" Nick asks, sliding his hands underneath Louis's hoody and into the small of his back. 

"Only the good ones," Louis says, wriggling a little under Nick's touch. 

Nick laughs. "Only the good ones," he says, shaking his head. "What am I getting myself into?"

"This," Louis says, and nudges Nick back against the wall, and kisses him again. "We're getting into this."

"All right, then," Nick says, and kisses him back.


End file.
